Características da carcaça e qualidade da carne de cordeiros mestiços submetidos a dietas com diferentes níveis de inclusão de torta de girassol.

Abstract

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the quantitative characteristics of the carcass, tissue composition of the leg and the constituents not carcass of crossbred lambs, fed diets with increasing levels of sunflower cake inclusion. Twenty-four male castrated, Santa Inês x Dorper lambs, with initial weight of 18.9 ± 2.17 kg, which were distributed in a completely randomized design with four treatments and six repetitions. Experimental diets were composed of corn hay, ground corn, soybean meal, mineral salt and the following inclusion levels of sunflower cake, which corresponded to the treatments: 0, 5, 10 and 15% in the whole ration. The animals were kept in confinement until they reach an average of 32.1 ± 2.6 kg body weight. Carcass yield (hot, cold and biological), decreased linearly (p<0.05) according to the increase of the inclusion levels of the pie, whose averages were 47.48%, 46.95% and 56.76%, respectively. Among the characteristics that evaluate the carcass muscling, the muscularity leg, croup circumference and the weight of the left half varied according to the increasing inclusion of sunflower cake in the diet, taking the first quadratic effect and the other, decreasing linear. The weights and yields of cuts, tissue composition of the leg, as well as non carcass were not influenced constituents (p> 0.05) by diet. The sunflower cake can be included in corn and soybean based diets until the level of 15% without causing any change in most of the characteristics of the constituents and not carcass constituents.